A Backwards glance
by sugar230
Summary: Brass has spent his career avoiding his past. But what can he do when his past comes to find him? rating incase it gets ugly later. chapter 2 gets a fair bit more graphic with strong language and an intimate'ish' encounter
1. A chance encounter

Disclaimer: I am unfortunately not the owner of CSI.

"Well then I guess we need to go through this one more time."

Brass walked slowly around the table and sat in a chair opposite to a man that looked very, very nervous. It was the third time they'd been over this suspect's story in the thirty minutes they'd spent in the stifling interrogation room. "_Why didn't they bother putting air conditioning in the interrogation rooms?"_ he wondered dully as he pulled the neckline of his starched shirt, searching for a cool, refreshing breeze that was not there.

Brass had worked hard to maintain a reputation of being an unyielding interrogator. He prided himself on his ability to get a story out of the most uncooperative person this wild city could throw at him, but he was forced to admit, inwardly at least, that this guy was beginning to try his patience. As if to solidify his annoyance, the suspect chose that time to burst into a fit of tears.

"I swear I didn't do it!" he wailed. It would have drawn pity out of anyone but Brass. This hardened detective had seen too many good actors to fall for any kind of charade.

"Your statement claimed you had never before met the victim. Security photos taken from the hotel where she was found dead place you at a table in the restaurant having dinner with her. Kindly tell me why you were having dinner with someone you'd never met." Brass's tone was harsh, stopping just short of cruel.

"Bli – blind date?" Things were looking worse and worse for this guy.

"Come on now, even you didn't buy that! Tell me what you know or you can spend the night in jail under arrest for her murder!"

"You can't…"

"Oh I can." Brass was getting a little excited; he knew the look on this guy's face. He was about to crack.

"Well…then I guess I'm going to prison to await trial because I don't know anything else." The suspect tapped some unseen reserve of strength to stand up to the man that had been accusing him of a crime for the past half hour.

"Dammit!" Brass lost his cool and slammed his fist on the desk. "We are not leaving until I get some answers!" He glanced towards the mirror behind him where he knew Grissom, his head CSI, was watching his progress. Gil had worked hard for three consecutive shifts to get enough evidence against this guy down to warrant bringing him in. If Brass couldn't get something out of him it would all be for nothing.

"Looks like it's gonna be a long night." Brass told Grissom with a significant glance that told Grissom his time would be better spent working on something than watching them there. Of course to the suspect it looked as if his captor was loosing his mind, as he was suddenly beginning to talk to himself.

* * *

Grissom walked out of the room adjoining the interrogation room sighing. He had no doubt that Brass would eventually get what he wanted out of the witness, he was just worried what a long and unproductive interrogation would do to his coworker. He wasn't likely to emerge from that room in any kind of good mood.

As he walked down the hall Grissom became aware that there was some kind of struggle taking place in the hallway, near the entrance to the building. The receptionist there and a police officer were trying to restrain a girl. Grissom could see she was young, she didn't look to be any older than 21, and was probably still a teenager. The girl was struggling as hard as she could against the people trying to restrain her and making such a scene that Grissom was slightly startled. He headed down the hall quickly towards her, speeding up, as she began screaming "No, NO!

"What is going on here!" The CSI was forced to yell to make himself heard over the noise produced by the scene before him. As he got closer he realized that the girl was trying with all her might, not to get out of the building – as he had expected to find, assuming her to be a suspect proven killer or something equally as life-ending – but that she was in fact fighting tooth and nail to gain entry to the building.

"Let her go!" Grissom yelled.

Everyone was so surprised at his entrance into the struggle, having been too busy with the struggle to notice his approach, that they stopped immediately and the noise in the hall dropped considerably.

"That's better," Grissom continued. "Now what's going on here?"

With everyone calmed down sufficiently, Grissom got his first good look at the teenage girl standing before him and he was shocked at what he found. Where he had expected to find a young girl, in her prime of life, he was instead greeted by an old woman staring at him from behind a teenager's eyes. The girl was filthy; her hair was ragged and obviously hadn't been washed in quite some time and she looked as though she hadn't had a meal in weeks. Despite her somewhat appalling outward appearance, it was the girl's eyes that kept Grissom rooted to the spot. He couldn't believe the pain he saw in them, far too much for someone as young as she.

"Why – Why don't you come with me and we can talk." Grissom gathered himself and led the girl into the break room of the lab guiding her gently with one hand on the small of her back. Despite his efforts to guide her in the right direction the girl began to stray in the wrong direction and Grissom reached out for the elbow of her right arm to get her back on track.

The girl jumped as though she'd been shot at and shot a terrified glance at Grissom's face as she recoiled from his outreached hand.

"Sorry." Grissom assured her quickly. "I didn't mean to…"

"No it's fine." The girl quickly removed any look of panic from her face and replaced it with one that reminded Grissom forcibly of Brass in an interrogation room. It was far too cold.

Grissom opened the door to the break room and, thankfully, found it empty. He sat the girl down in a chair at the table in the center of the room and moved towards the small refrigerator. He rummaged through it quickly, searching for something edible and pushing past a few experiments to snatch an apple from the back. "_I'll pay Sara back later" _he thought as he handed the apple to the stony-faced teen. She eyed him warily for a moment and then bit into the apple ravenously. She'd nearly finished it by the time Grissom returned from the sink, handing her a glass of water.

"Well, were you hungry?" Grissom joked, trying to break the ice a little, or at least wipe that cold look from her face. He didn't succeed. The girl only looked at him as though she was stunned he was capable of intelligent thought at all and he quickly decided to change the subject.

"My name's Gil Grissom and I'm the lead investigator here. What's your name?" he enquired as politely as he could.

At the mention of his name the expression on the girl's face was instantly replaced with one of relief. Her eyes flicked from his face, to his badge, and back, and Grissom was surprised to see tears beginning to form in her eyes.

"You work here?" she asked him, her voice not betraying any sign of the relief he saw in her face.

"Yes."

"My name's Ellie," she burst out at once, "and I'm looking for…for someone." The look of distrust on her face was hastily replaced. Grissom wondered to himself whether this girl trusted anyone, and then remembered that she was in need of his assistance.

"And you think I can help you?"

"I know you can…I'm looking for my father. Jim Brass."

Well here's the first chapter and I definitely need to hear your reviews so I can determine whether or not the story's good enough to continue. Any criticism is welcome but please keep it kind (and clean). Looking forward to hearing from you!


	2. Daddy's little girl

**Disclaimer: still not the owner of CSI.**

Brass cracked his knuckles menacingly, just for show, and paused for a moment to watch his prey sweat. This time he had him. This guy was gonna sing for him like a love struck canary. _I have got to give up on these sad clichés. I'm getting worse than Gil here._ He was brought back to interrogation room mid-smirk by the next words out of the suspect's mouth.

"Alright…I …I may have…seen her."

"_I KNEW it!"_ Brass congratulated himself before continuing in harsh tones. "And…!"

At that exact moment, when Brass had finally worked his way past this guy's cover, a guard burst into the room and broke the suspect off mid-sentence. Nearly an hour of Brass's work was undone in an instant. He was not pleased.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE!" he screamed at the intruding guard. "Are you completely out of your mind? I've been in here for a goddamn hour!"

The guard winced slightly at the outburst but was not deterred from his reason for being there. His fear of Gil Grissom was only slightly higher than that of Jim Brass, no way was he going back to him and saying he couldn't do as he was asked.

"I'm sorry sir, but you're needed in the break room. I was told it is highly urgent."

Brass was surprised enough to momentarily forget about his rage at being interrupted. What could have possibly been so important, in the break room of all places, that he had to be interrupted in such a crucial case? He decided it was worth investigating anyway and followed the shaken guard out of the room.

"Don't move." He growled at the suspect as he left. There was an audible sigh out of the man left alone in the interrogation room.

* * *

Gil Grissom glanced again at his watch. He shook his wrist slightly, his watch clanging along with the motion, and checked it again. It wasn't his watch, he finally concluded. Time itself didn't seem to be behaving properly. He could have sworn that far more than three minutes had passed since the stranger sitting before him had made such an outstanding claim. The guard he sent to retrieve the detective had only been gone a few moments when the girl decided she'd had enough of the silence. 

"Do you know my dad or not?" The bite in the girl's voice took Grissom by surprise. It had been a long time since anyone had had enough nerve to address him as rudely as this girl had decided to. He wasn't quite sure how to respond, but things were beginning to come together in his mind and he decided to play the game as the girl laid it out for him.

"And if I do?" Grissom answered her carefully, without any commitment.

"Typical male," was the girl's only response. She continued to stare blankly at the wall behind Grissom, who was facing the door.

"Alright, I do know him." Grissom decided to give in, if only to satisfy his own curiosity. "And he's never mentioned anything about a daughter to me!"

Ellie chuckled slightly. She wasn't at all surprised by the news that her father was not one to brag about his daughter back home. Her years on the streets had hardened her against such feelings as pain and regret, but she had seen something of them in the eyes of the investigator who stood across from her trying to solve the puzzle before him. She could see how badly he wanted to figure out the situation before him. She'd met his kind before, though they never lasted long, the type of person that had to be in control or they fell apart. It was time for her to have a little fun.

"No?" she began playing the man across from her. "Never?" She schooled her features to mimic a mood of complete despair, she waited a moment for the tears to reach her eyes, and then looked up to Grissom with a look she knew no man could face without melting.

Grissom was suddenly ashamed of himself. He had tried playing this girl's game and now she was hurt. She looked like she'd been though a lot and he'd only managed to add to her emotional load. _What if Jim was just keeping his private life private? What if this girl had been through something terrible?_

Ellie chanced a look up to Grissom's face and immediately knew she had him. His face was no longer harsh or uncaring, _I knew it was only an act_ but was, on the contrary, full of concern for her well being. Now was her time to strike.

"Oh well maybe it's because I'm the spawn of the marriage he betrayed with the local whore…"

Grissom was shaken not only by the words now issuing out of the girl's mouth but also by her sudden change in form. Where mere seconds before there had sat a broken and bruised girl, he was now sitting across from a hardened and unyielding adolescent that refused to take orders from anyone.

"Or maybe, he hasn't mentioned me…because for the past four years I've been turning tricks and smoking crack! That might be it. Yes I can see why daddy wouldn't want to brag about his own little offspring, the whore!"

Grissom was glued to his chair, the shock registering on his face plainly for Ellie to see. Unfortunately his misfortune in this encounter had further to go; for now the teenage girl was standing up, and moving towards him. Before he could think of how to react he found himself with a girl in his lap, squirming provocatively.

"And it's looks like I got here just in time." The words emanating from the girl's mouth were little more than a moan. "You look tight as hell, I know you, and how you want. You need a little whore don't you big boy?" The moan was accompanied by a slight chuckle.

Grissom's horror at the situation had completely immobilized him. It wasn't until he felt a tingling sensation in his groin that the full severity of the situation rushed to him, at the same time that most the blood rushed, unfortunately, away from his brain. _"No!" he thought to himself. "I will not lose control. I cannot give her control of me!"_ And mustering his strength (both of body and will) he pushed the girl away from him and stood up.

With a rude awakening Ellie found herself on the floor, having been forcibly removed from her previous perch. She was completely shocked to discover that she had no control over this man, that he would not be diverted by her, it had been a long time since that had happened to her.

"Fine, go to hell then!" She started screaming at Grissom without fully realizing why she was doing it but it made her feel slightly less out of place and so she continued, "I CAME HERE FOR YOUR HELP AND YOU'RE USELESS YOU STUPID ASS!" and so on until she was in danger of making herself hoarse.

* * *

Brass was steaming towards the break room when he heard a noise that made him stop dead in his tracks. A woman had begun screaming. _"No, not a woman,"_ _he thought_ _"a little girl! My little…"_ No that was impossible, his daughter wanted nothing to do with him, the last time he'd seen her she'd made that quite clear. He wondered dully whether she'd received his last care package, which of course led to wonderings of how and why his sweet little princess had gotten to the position she was in. 

While he'd stopped for his momentary backwards glance, Brass had also stopped walking towards the break room. He snapped out of it to find the woman's screams were still continuing and so he set off at a jog to ascertain what exactly was going on. When he reached the door he was forced to stop dead in his tracks once again.

The screams stopped when Ellie saw her father walk into the room.

"Daddy!" she shrieked in what could also be conceived as happiness if not for the deadened echo behind her words. And she ran to embrace him, wrapping her slender bony arms around his neck. Brass spotted the familiar signs of scarring on the inside of her elbows.

Grissom could do nothing but stare. He shared a look with Brass but couldn't think of what to say. He was at a complete loss for words…for the first time he could remember.

**Haha…wish I could see the look on Brass's face! But then I guess that's the joy of the written word, you can see it for yourself in whatever way you prefer! Please please review (it help's me continue I swear!). In response toa question in a previous review, I planned this story to take place early in the season, shortly after Brass was replaced by Grissom and put back on homicide. Though I am an avid follower of CSI now (have been for the past couple of seasons) I didn't watch as closely during the earlier seasons so I'm sorry if the timeline doesn't seem to fit perfectly. Thanx so much for the review. Keepthem coming and I'll keep on writing.**


End file.
